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Ostracism Leads to Increase Aggression

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Ostracism Lead to Increased Aggression

Ostracism may be described in simple terms as the exclusion from a group or society.

It was an Athenian democratic way that included the expulsion of any citizen from the city-

state of Athens for ten years. The removal or exclusion of a person from society or a group

often triggers particular behaviours, including anger, sadness and increased aggression. The

increased aggression occurs as a natural response to the exclusion because an individual gets

a sense of losing control, anger or fear. According to Jiang & Chen (2020), aggression is a

natural reaction for a person who has been ostracized to feel less helpful and more aggressive

to others. The aggression may not only affect the person who has led to it but also persons

around or interacting with the one who has been affected. This paper will discuss how

ostracism leads to increased aggression.

How Ostracism leads to Increased Aggression

Zhang et al. (2019) explain that ostracism increases automatic aggression. When a

person faces exclusion or is ignored by others, automatic aggression increases. In their study,

Zhang et al. (2019) explain that ostracism leads to adverse impacts on individuals' mental

health and cognition, increasing their aggression. Many researchers have identified a positive

relationship between ostracism and aggression, and this research found similar results. For

example, when compared to those in future belonging groups, participants in future rejection

groups gave an adverse job evaluation to a person who offended them. Ostracism leads to

increased aggression, mainly when a person’s senses of control and meaningful existence in a

particular group have been ended. They feel they need to be aggressive because they lost

control or want to regain their position in a certain group. Zheng et al. (2019) explain that

anger is one of the factors that a person who has been excluded feels. Consequently, anger
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leads to the development of aggressive behavior. Therefore, ostracism leads to increased

aggression, with anger resulting from ostracism causing aggressive behavior.

According to Ren et al. (2018), ostracism hurts and thus leads to aggression. The

researchers reviewed research on the relationship between ostracism and aggression in the

past two decades. Both experimental and correlational studies significantly supported the

model’s prediction that ostracism could prompt aggression. When a person feels hurt, they

naturally become aggressive. People always feel the need to connect with others, and a

problem arises when that does not happen. The situation worsens when they are excluded as

they become hurt, leading to aggressive behavior. Ostracism threatens the need for humans to

feel connected with others in society, eliciting significant adverse effects. When people feel

excluded, they experience anger, sadness and pain. In addition, the satisfaction of four basic

psychological needs, including control, self-esteem, meaningful existence and belonging,

reduces. Consequently, they develop aggressive behaviors. This study thus states that

ostracism leads to aggressive behavior because the people being excluded feel hurt and

develop aggressive behaviors as a reaction to the new feeling. DeWall et al. (2010) also stress

the point that it is natural for social rejection to hurt, thereby causing aggressive behavior,

even against innocent people. According to the study, acceptance from others reduces the

effects of social rejection, thereby making the people excluded less likely to be aggressive

towards others.

Li et al. (2019) explain that there is a direct link between ostracism and increased

aggression, with self-esteem being the mediating factor. They conducted a study drawing

from the social control theory, sociometer model of self-esteem and organism-environment

interaction model. The research assessed a moderated mediation model including self-esteem

(mediator), ostracism (predictor variable), implicit theories of personalities (moderator) and

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aggression (outcome variable). The participants included 383 Chinese adolescents. Results

showed that there was a strong positive relationship between ostracism and aggression. In

addition, the results showed that self-esteem mediated the link between ostracism and

aggression. Further research shows that entity theories of personalities moderated the path

from self-esteem to aggression. That indicates that when adolescents are excluded from

groups or places where they feel they belong, their self-esteem is negatively affected.

Consequently, they develop aggressive behaviors.

There is always a desire by people to interact and connect with others socially.

Individuals want to be associated with people, groups or places where they feel they belong.

When that connection is eliminated, the person feels or experiences negative psychological or

physical outcomes (Wesselmann et al., 2017). Ostracism is an adverse social experience

which impedes the need for social connection. It can happen socially, physically or online.

Feelings of ostracism can also arise even when minimal social cues that show one is

relationally devalued are exhibited. According to Wesselmann et al. (2017), ostracized

persons behave more aggressively socially than included persons. The objective is to re-

establish the connection they previously had that they feel have been taken away. They try

hard to ensure they re-establish the links and feel they belong. Therefore, the researchers

concluded that ostracism elicits an aggressive behavior towards the source, bystanders and

other people. The behavior is not just retaliatory but also affects other people.

As per a study conducted by DeWall et al. (2009), there is no doubt that ostracism

leads to aggression. When a person is excluded from a group where they feel they belong,

they will develop aggressive behavior. Social rejection leads to a feeling of worthlessness and

triggers a reaction, including aggressive behavior. According to this study, multiple studies

tested the hypothesis that social exclusion increases the inclination to perceive neutral
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information as hostile, which increases aggression. Results showed that when compared to

control and accepted participants, the socially excluded participants had a higher probability

of rating ambiguous and aggressive words as similar and ambiguous actions of others as

hostile. That shows the excluded persons had more aggressive behaviors than the persons

who were included or who were accepted in groups or areas where they felt they belonged.

According to Jiang & Chen (2020), ostracism leads to aggressive behaviors. The

researchers used deprivation as a mediating factor between ostracism and aggressive

behavior. They tested if ostracism elicits feelings of relative deprivation and if that relative

deprivation accounts for the effects of ostracism on aggression. Relative to those who

recalled either neutral or inclusive experiences, participants who recalled ostracism

experiences reported higher levels of relative deprivation. That feeling of relative deprivation

mediated the impact of ostracism on aggression. Framing ostracism as an experience of non-

deprivation weakens the link between aggression and ostracism. That is an appropriate way

of reducing aggression after an ostracism experience. Therefore, the results show the

importance of relative deprivation in shaping individual responses toward ostracism. This

study shows that ostracism leads to deprivation, which contributes to aggressive behaviors.

Conclusion

Many studies have concluded that there is a positive relationship between ostracism

and aggression (DeWall et al., 2010; Li et al., 2019: Ren et al., 2018 & Zhang et al., 2019).

The studies have also shown that mediating factors contribute to this phenomenon. For

instance, anger after being excluded from a group may contribute to aggressive behavior.

Aggressive behavior comes as a natural reaction to the experiences of individuals. However,

different people may react differently to different situations. The objective of the reaction

may be to be accepted back into the group or force themselves back into the group.
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References

DeWall, C. N., Twenge, J. M., Bushman, B., Im, C., & Williams, K. (2010). A little

acceptance goes a long way: applying social impact theory to the rejection-aggression

link. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 1(2), 168-174.

https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550610361387

DeWall, C. N., Twenge, J. M., Gitter, S. A., & Baumeister, R. F. (2009). It's the thought that

counts: The role of hostile cognition in shaping aggressive responses to social

exclusion. Journal of personality and social psychology, 96(1), 45.

https://doi.org/10.1037/a0013196

Jiang, T., & Chen, Z. (2020). Relative deprivation: A mechanism for the ostracism–

aggression link. European journal of social psychology, 50(2), 347-359.

https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2621

Li, S., Zhao, F., & Yu, G. (2019). Ostracism and aggression among adolescents: Implicit

theories of personality moderated the mediating effect of self-esteem. Children and

Youth Services Review, 100, 105-111.

Ren, D., Wesselmann, E. D., & Williams, K. D. (2018). Hurt people hurt people: Ostracism

and aggression. Current Opinion in Psychology, 19, 34-38. https://coek.info/pdf-hurt-

people-hurt-people-ostracism-and-aggression-.html

Wesselmann, E. D., Ren, D., & Williams, K. D. (2017). Ostracism and aggression.

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2016-49468-010

Zhang, D., Li, S., Shao, L., Hales, A. H., Williams, K. D., & Teng, F. (2019). Ostracism

increases automatic aggression: The role of anger and forgiveness. Frontiers in

psychology, 2659. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02659